Chapter 29 (1/2)

In the end, I was right. I know that doesn't really narrow things down, as I am right about a lot of things, but this time in particular I was extra right about how our breakfast would turn out to be our lunch in the end. Furthermore, what started out to be just another stunt by my girlfriends sneakily escalated into The Calamity Lunch Version 2.0: Electric Boogaloo.

Well, fine, I might be slightly overly dramatic here. It wasn't as disastrous as the last time, but it was still a pain in the neck. As they say, too many cooks spoil the broth, and that idiom has rarely been as fitting as in this case. For some unexplainable reason Angie, Snowy, and even Josh followed after my girlfriends, ostensibly to help with their impromptu competition, yet their meddling somehow resulted in full course meal that got finished way outside of the time frame of 'breakfast', and consisted of a bunch of heavy dishes that did not complement each other the slightest. At this point I could go into the extravagant nature of those dishes and even ponder where their exotic ingredients came from, but I would rather not go down that rabbit hole right now.

At the end of the meal, which may or may not have concluded with a swift and merciless scolding, Judy and Elly solemnly declared that the results were a draw, then they promised to me that they wouldn't get carried away like that in the future.

”It's decided then! We are going on a group date on Sunday!” Elly declared with a fist pump while obviously getting carried away.

”You are making a scene,” I chided her, prompting her to glance back at me over her shoulder with an apologetic smile, so I hastily added, ”Pay attention while walking.”

She blinked at me in surprise, but then she obediently turned back and continued whatever dastardly date plans she was in the process of hatching with the help of my dearest assistant while we walked. Wait, does this require some context? I suppose it does.

So, after we had our fill with our over-the-top lunch and shared some more much-needed exposition with Josh, I finally decided to stop delaying the inevitable, and so our little fellowship set out on a decidedly less-than-epic journey to meet the fabled arch-wizard of Blue Cherry High. Damn, my life is weird…

Anyways, in a great display of self-organizing chaos, our group naturally formed into three lines. On the forefront were Snowy and Angie, with Josh pushing his moped between the two of them as they shared even more vital information about the terrible dangers of the world of the supernatural masquerade, interspersed with random arguments about Trucy the Werewolf Huntress and some other shows I knew little about. In other words, business as usual.

Right behind them walked my two girlfriends, their discussion filled with a weird mixture of secretive harmony and sudden competitive outbursts. Also business as usual.

By process of elimination, that left me trailing behind them all with an especially sullen class rep at my side. Also, while I know the rule of three kind of demands it, but no, that wasn't business as usual, so I am not even going to pretend so. That said, this configuration meant that we have pretty much occupied the whole sidewalk, which actually made me acutely aware of something quite unusual… or rather, it was very normal, but because it was, it was not.

Okay, I stop beating around the bush: it was the placeholder population. When I told Elly to keep it down because she was drawing attention, I actually meant it. For maybe the first time since I could remember, the placeholders actually seemed to pay attention to us. No, before even that: they were actually on the street! I mean, I think I have already noted that the number of placeholders walking around and doing their business was increasing over time, but this early afternoon I felt like we crossed some kind of threshold; now the actual streets felt lived in. There was still not a speck of dust on the road or a stray piece of candy wrapper on the grass, so it still wasn't super authentic, but it was definitely more so than just a week or so before.

I couldn't help but wonder; was this supposed to be the natural progression of this world? We actually discussed this with Judy in the past, and she even had a theory about how maybe the world was a kind of simulation where it was supposed to run for a while for the placeholders to gather 'character' before the actual action or game or experiment or whatever this world was designed for was started. It was a somewhat elegant explanation of the rudimentary behavior patterns of the placeholders and their slow yet steady improvement on that front, but it still presupposed that the world was designed, or at the very least had some intent behind it, something of which I still wasn't one hundred percent certain.

As I was having these thoughts, I couldn't help but shake my head in irritation. There was still so little I knew about this world or dream or simulation or something, and unfortunately, it seemed like any earnest research would have to be put on hold once again, at least until I could make sure our lives and well-being weren't threatened by the plot. Speaking of which, I also reminded myself for the umpteenth time to pay attention to my own thought processes to catch any signs of some kind of narrative meddling in action. Regrettably, knowing that my own thoughts can be sneakily tweaked by an unseen force was not particularly comforting, and paying attention to every stray brainwave only made the stress worse.

”Haaahhh…”

And then the girl with the glasses by my side started letting out dramatic sighs like that! For a while, I actually hesitated whether or not I should ask or play dumb and avoid a potential landmine, but by this point I had a feeling she was doing it just to get me to ask, so I let out a shallow breath of my own and decided to bite it.

”Why the long face?” I asked tentatively, only for her to immediately turn towards me with a frown.

”I still don't understand how you figured it all out!” Ammy complained, earning a confused look from me.

”You mean, about Josh? Didn't I already tell you?”

”But it still makes no sense,” she grumbled as she put her hands into her coat pockets. ”If these prophecies were secret, then how do you know about them? Don't tell me it's 'I'm an information broken' again…”

”Nah, I just asked.” She didn't seem convinced, so I explained, ”Elly told me about the prophecy on her own. Then when I talked with Angie, we talked about their hallowed leader and their prophecy came up during that, and then I asked Snowy if they had something similar the next time we talked.”

”Yeah, I wanted to ask about that too!” she interjected while her brows somehow descended even further. ”How did you even know Angeline was a Celestial? And for how long?”

I couldn't give an immediate answer this time, as it involved some meta-logic, so after a few seconds I shrugged and deflected with a non-committal, ”It was fairly obvious.”

”What do you mean 'fairly obvious'?” Ammy practically hissed at me. ”I've known her since middle school, and I never even suspected her!”

At this point the words 'She is called ANGELine!' were on the tip of my tongue, but I managed to swallow them back with inhuman effort, and instead I told her, ”That just shows that I'm exceptionally good when it comes to deduction.”

”Sure, just dodge the question,” Ammy grumbled and rolled her eyes at me. ”You are being 'exceptionally good' at that too. In fact, you are being too exceptional at too many things.”

”Am I?” I asked back just a little uncertainly, which earned me a sudden, but by no means unexpected, harrumph.

”Do I have to spell it out?” I immediately nodded, so she explained to me in a weary voice. ”Just to list the most glaring ones: you fought a Faun General and won. You fought a Chimera and killed it. You faced a Lord of the Abyss and you lived to tell the tale. On top of that you have money, the looks, your background is simultaneously too normal and yet mysterious, and while you are dangerously knowledgeable about all the Old Blooded, you do not belong to any of them.”

”W-Well,” I stammered for a moment, ”To be fair, I can't really do anything about the looks department, but thanks for the compliment.”

”And there you are, grabbing onto the most insignificant thing to change the direction of the conversation. I'm not even mad at this point, only disappointed.”

”Ouch, class rep. That hurt. Mentally. Also, you are waaay more grouchy than usual.”

”I think I said this before, but just to reiterate: Whose fault do you think that is?” She paused for a long moment, apparently waiting for me to say something, but since I remained silent she simply shook her head and said, ”Let me stress this one more time: You killed a Chimera. Those are supposed to be so rare they are more or less legendary at this point, and even grandfather would've had a tough time facing one. Do you have any idea how much effort it took me to sort that mess out?”

”Hey, I didn't do it to cause you trouble!” I defended myself. ”Also, it was a team effort. I can distinctly remember a certain girl's golem thingie contributing quite a bit. Not to mention, I wasn't the one who brought the bloody thing over. If you want to blame someone for all that happened, blame Crowey, not me. ”

”Fine, you are right,” she admitted with a voice that said she was still quite cranky. ”But you being right doesn't change the fact that I still have mountains of paperwork to deal with when I go home today, and about half of it is because you—”

”Okay, time out!” I cut her short while signaling the same thing with my hands. ”You keep saying that, but why are you doing paperwork in the first place?” Instead of answering me, she gave me one of those classic uncomprehending looks you would show when someone asked you which cereal flavor was your favorite mode of transportation, so I quickly reiterated, ”I mean, why are you, in particular, doing paperwork? You are what? Sixteen?”

”So are you,” she retorted with another frown, but I dismissed her with a wave of my hand.

”Seventeen on paper, but it doesn't matter. We are talking about you. I'm sure you have other people at the School who could deal with paperwork, so why are you doing it?”

This time the look she gave me was a bit more pensive, even hesitant, but after a quick glance at the front of our little procession, she seemed to finally reach a decision and gestured for me to come closer.

”Before I tell you the details, I have a quick question for you. Do you know what happened at Cardiff?”

”Cardiff?” I repeated after her. I naturally knew what she was talking about, as it was the notorious 'Cardhouse incident' that was, among other things, my primary cover as Admin over at the Celestial Hub. ”Well, unless this is a trick question, the main thing that comes to mind is the incident when the Celestials tried to infiltrate a School and got caught red-handed. It was about three or so months ago, right?”

Amelia's face momentarily slackened in surprise, apparently not expecting me to actually answer her question, but then her expression quickly switched again as she nodded.

”Correct,” she stated, then after a second or so she added, ”I'll be damned. Maybe you are an informant after all…”

”That's neither here nor there,” I spoke dismissively. ”But back to the original question: what does what happened at Cardiff have to do with paperwork?”

”More or less everything,” she told me accompanied by a tired groan. ”Before Cardiff, a lot of the more mundane operations of the Schools were done by normal humans. The Celestials used this hole in our security to plant spies in our administration. Not only that, they have been doing it for at least two generations.”

”Yeah, they are sly like that. Almost disturbingly so,” I spoke carelessly, earning me an approving grunt from Ammy.

”They are,” she said while making another sneak peek at a certain overly enthusiastic girl in the front, who was in the process of trying to convince Snowy to read some romance book about a friendly wight or something, like she didn't have a care in the world. Anyways, Ammy soon turned back to me and said, ”So, as per the usual habit of the Assembly, they quickly threw the baby out with the bathwater and created a new law so that sensitive documents can only be handled by Magi directly related to the leadership of the School in question.”

”And that's you,” I guessed.

”Indeed,” she answered with a mixture of exhaustion and indignation. ”Since I'm grandfather's only blood relative, I have to do literally all the important accounting in the School, which includes things such as, let's say, someone killing a Chimera on School grounds.”

”I get it, geez,” I rolled my eyes at her barbed words, ”Would you have preferred if I let it eat someone?”

”No,” she denied immediately, but then she added, ”Do you have any idea how much paperwork would that have caused!?”

I blinked at her response, unable to decide whether she was serious or not, but since her expression didn't lighten even after a couple of seconds, I lightly cleared my throat and cautiously told her, ”… Class rep, I think you really need to take a break. I can't help but feel that doing all that accounting might've ever so slightly maybe partially mostly or at the very least totally consumed your entire thought process.”

”And whose fault do you think—?”

”Yes, yes, it's my fault,” I hastily admitted lest she would go on another tirade. Ammy only huffed, and I was afraid she would continue to complain if not for the fact that we were just a stone's throw away from the school's main gates. Seeing that, she only gave me a flat glance, and then she began jogging to get to the front of the group, leaving me all alone at the back. Not for long though, as after a few seconds my two girlfriends decelerated and fell in line on my two sides.

”We are going on a date this Sunday,” Judy immediately informed me.

”Just the two of you? Oh well, have fun.”

”Of course not,” Elly countered with a small frown. ”It's all three of us.”

”I know, I was kidding,” I stressed before rolling my eyes. ”However, could we discuss this after we talked with the Magi? You know, just in case things get messy and there would be no time for any dates at all?”

”True,” Judy spoke up with a decidedly disapproving tone. ”You have already tempted fate, so it's far from impossible.”

”Oh, please. Don't tell me you actually believe in superstition like that?”

”It's not about superstition, Chief,” my dear assistant explained. ”As far as we know, tempting fate like that could be very real. I believe you even mentioned that you already considered that things like 'rules of comedic and dramatic timing' were actual, tangible things.

”Well, I suppose I did…” I spoke carefully while thinking hard about how to explain myself. ”However, you see, Josh had already done it, right? Therefore, if jinxing is a thing and something bad happens because of it, it will be his fault, and me following his example would have little significance. However, if jinxing is not a thing, then it doesn't matter if I did it as well, as nothing would happen either way. See, it's quite logical.”

”That sounds like ad-hoc rationalization to me,” Judy grumbled flatly

”Rubbish! I am always the model of a rational mind,” I scoffed in return.

”Is it a scale model?”

”Of course. If it wasn't, it wouldn't fit into my head.”

”I see. I learn something new every day.”

”What are you talking about?” Elly interjected with a confused expression.

”Nothing serious,” I reassured her while I simultaneously glanced up the hill towards the school gates, and after a short while my brows involuntarily furrowed. ”Jokes and jinxes aside, what should I be expecting once we are in the School? What's Ammy's grandpa like?”

”I don't think I ever met him,” Judy stated after quickly returning to her usual expression. ”I think he might've given a speech at the opening ceremony, but my memories from back then are a little vague.”

”Wait, hold on,” I spoke up in a hurry. ”So he is actually the headmaster of the school as well? I mean, I knew he was the head of the School, but not the school.”

”That was confusing,” Elly said while grimacing, and I couldn't help but agree with her. Just whose bright idea was to call the hub of a magical secret society operating under a school a 'School'?

”Anyways, I didn't even go to the opening ceremony, so I don't think I've ever seen the guy.”

”You have seriously never met Lord Endymonion before?” Elly asked in a somewhat baffled voice, but she wasn't nearly as surprised as I was.

”Lord Endymonion? Really?”

”Yes, that's his name,” she told me like it was really obvious. ”I've known him since I was a kid. Our family had to pay him a visit every time we came to Critias.”

”Figures. But why 'Lord'?”

”All the Arch-mages of the Assembly are called lords,” Judy answered my question immediately while giving me a look saying 'That's common knowledge, didn't you read any of the reports I gave you?!'

”Oh, right,” I spoke while scratching my chin, ”It totally slipped my mind for a moment.”

It was at this very moment when we reached the gates, which then promptly opened, cutting our already less than fruitful discussion short. At first I thought it was automatic, but then from behind the gap, my eyes met with those of Armband Guy.

He looked exactly the same as usual; his black hair cropped short, his small, round glasses sitting high on his hawkish nose, his cheeks sullen and giving him a gaunt appearance, and he was wearing his uniform as impeccably as ever, with a bright red band on his right arm. He looked over us before his eyes landed and stayed on Ammy.

”Hello Pascal,” she greeted him, and the guy returned it with a small nod. ”Please inform grandfather we are going to visit him.”

”I see you found the Abyssal,” he stated with a disinterested voice. ”I suppose you want to talk with him about her.”

”Yes, among other things,” Ammy nodded, at which point Armband Guy gestured for us to come through the gates before he hastily closed them behind us.

After doing so, he faced our group again and simply said, ”You know the way.”

”Yes,” the class rep nodded, at which point he returned to his duty of… standing by the gates. Weird.

Anyways, we waited for Josh to park his moped under the roof of the bicycle storage area, then once he was back, Ammy gestured for us to follow her. After a few steps, I carefully sidled up next to her and asked, ”What's that guy's deal?”

”Pascal's?” she asked back, and I gave her a nod. ”What do you mean? He was the same as usual.”

”I get it, but… Is he actually a student? I mean, classes are still in, and he is just standing out there like that?”

”He takes his Student Council duties very seriously.”

”That wasn't what I was…” I began, but then I shook my head. ”You know what? Never mind.”

Ammy looked at me funny, but before she could ask, I pulled the breaks so that I ended up next to Judy again and I told her in a whisper, ”Raise Armband Guy from placeholder to a possible side character.”

”Way ahead of you,” she answered while showing me her phone.

”Good,” I told her with a nod, then I followed after Ammy towards our destination, which seemed to be the entrance of the basement of the school.

”This way,” she told us as she stopped right in front of the fairly mundane metal doors. ”The staff might be a little jumpy after what happened on Sunday, so don't touch anything, don't be too loud, and don't bother anyone we meet. Are we clear on that, everyone? Leo?”

”Hey!” I raised my voice in indignation. ”Why am I singled out?”

”You know why,” the class rep told me while doing that thing where she adjusted her glasses for emphasis, but before I could argue with her, she turned around and opened the door with a metallic clank, and since no one else spoke up for me, I had no choice but to silently swallow the injustice as I followed behind the others into the secret base of the local supernatural superpower.

”I'm not going to lie, I feel a little underwhelmed. Am I the only one who feels underwhelmed?”

Ammy let out a small groan and asked, through clenched teeth, ”Fine, I bite. Why are you underwhelmed?”

”Well…” I began as I gestured towards the smooth white metal walls of the spacious, well-lit elevator in which we were currently standing. ”For a start, we just kind of walked up to the lift. It was right by the basement entrance too. It wasn't even hidden behind a fake wall or anything. It was just there.”

”Why would you hide an elevator when people are using it every day?”

”She's got a point there,” the princess noted by my side.

”But… why is it a lift in the first place? And a totally normal one too! I thought we were going to use a teleportation circle or something.”

”Yeah.” This time Josh was the one who spoke up, taking my side for once. ”Using an ordinary elevator to meet a wizard totally takes the sense of adventure out of it.”

”The proper term is Arch-mage, not wizard,” Ammy countered politely, then she readjusted her glasses as she glanced back at me and told me in a much less polite fashion, ”Do you think teleport arrays grow on trees?! Setting one up would use up half of our quarterly budget! Not to mention, some of the people working down there, who cannot use mana, would not be able to move between the School and the surface without help. Do you think we have the manpower to have a senior Magi on transportation duty when an 'ordinary elevator' does the job just as well for a fraction of the cost?”

”Fine, I get it! Geez!” I cut in with a groan, but then I suddenly remembered something and then I asked, using a slightly more diplomatic tone, ”Just for the record, is teleportation really that costly?”

”Of course it is,” Ammy scoffed. ”Do you think breaking space itself and then mending it afterward is easy? You need a lot of rare reagents to create the arrays, then you would need two senior Magi to link them, and then whenever you would want to use them, you would need to use more valuable reagents. Why do you think only grandfather uses one to go back and forth between here and Glasgow for the Assembly meetings?”

”Well, I didn't know that, that's why I asked,” I defended myself, and to my surprise, the class rep seemed to take a proverbial step back in reaction.

”You are right, I suppose.”

”I have another question though,” I told her, and she looked up at me attentively, so I inquired, ”In theory, let's say that someone I knew had an artifact that can teleport them and other people they are in contact with to a predetermined location, no matter where they are. Is that a big deal?”

”A big deal?” Ammy asked back with eyes wide open. ”An artifact? You mean an object with an array on it? Is it single-use?”

”Let's say it is,” I muttered uncertainly, earning me an irritated scowl in the process.

”What do you mean 'let's say it—' … You know what, I don't even care. Now, to answer your question: even if it was just a single-use item, it would probably cause an uproar big enough to get not only the Assembly, but even the Celestials and the NSRS involved.”

”The what now?”

”The Non-causative Science Research Society,” Judy helpfully added.

”Father calls them 'the nerds',” came the next, slightly less helpful addendum from my other girlfriend.

”Hey, we call them that too!” Angie said next, though her addition was decidedly less useful to the conversation.

Anyways, I turned to Judy and told her, ”Thank you. Also, ixnay onyay ethay eleportationtay artifactyay.”

At first she gave me a weird look, but then there was a sudden spark of recognition in her eyes and she quickly took out her phone to follow my instructions.

”Was that pig latin?” Josh asked with a critically raised eyebrow, but before I could answer, the elevator shuddered as it came to a sudden halt. I had no idea whether it was slow, or we were going really deep, but considering I could feel my ears popping, my bet was on the latter.

Either way, once the lift door opened, I found myself staring down a long corridor with walls made of tightly packed stones of various shapes and sizes, kind of like a castle wall. On the other hand, the floor and the domed ceiling looked like they were made of solid white marble, and the whole place was evenly lit by a series of amorphous crystals glowing with a gentle blue light set in what at first glance looked like wrought iron torch sconces. On either side, I could see several large, elaborately designed wooden doors with huge brass handles, most of them closed, and while I couldn't see anybody, based on the faint noises I could hear, I was sure there were quite a few people down here.

”Now we are talking,” Josh took the words right out of my mouth, so all I could do was to nod in agreement.

Sure, the place was still way too pristine to feel like an authentic ancient subterranean vault, but with the glowing crystals and the torch sconces, at least we finally had some ambiance.

”You guys are weird,” Angie murmured.

”A few more things: keep your voices down, don't make a ruckus, and turn off your phones before we enter into grandfather's study,” Ammy spoke up as she stepped out of the elevator and gestured for us to follow, and we somehow formed into a line as we walked down the corridor. Honestly speaking, I was still a little bit underwhelmed. I mean, this was supposed to be the headquarters of the de-facto supernatural big boss of the island, and it wasn't even a smidgen as grandiose as, say, the Dracis mansion. Even the security seemed pretty lame, as there were only two of those green eye orb things in the opposite ends of the hallway.

While I was paying attention to those, I didn't notice Judy coming up to me right until she grabbed hold of my sleeve and tugged on it.

”Hm? Yes?”

She gestured for me to lean closer, so I did just that.

”Chief, I would like to add one more entry to Amelia's warnings,” she whispered conspiratorially. ”We are in the heart of Magi territory, and we are about to meet the most important Magi on the island. We already discussed your 'impulse control' problem before, so please try to dial it back and do not pick a fight with an arch-mage of the Assembly on his home grounds.”

”Oh, come on, Dormouse!” I whispered back after a quick roll of the eyes. ”I am not that irresponsible. Maybe if I was alone, sure, but I wouldn't drag you guys into a conflict like that even if I wasn't aware of the problem, and now that I am conscious of it, I will make sure to play nice.”

”Good to know,” my assistant told me, yet somehow I had a feeling I still didn't have her full confidence.

I couldn't explain myself any further, as we reached the biggest, heaviest door at the end of the hallway, and Ammy promptly knocked on it three times. After a long moment, I noticed a bunch of glowing white lines reminiscent of circuitry cascading across the surface of the wood, and a blink of an eye later the two wings of the door slowly yet steadily swung open without a sound.

I could hear Josh audibly gulp at my side, so I gave him a reassuring pat on the back. Surprisingly enough Snowy, who I thought would be the most nervous out of everyone present, seemed to be looking forward with a determined expression.

Once the door was more than half open, I could finally take a good look inside. When I did so, I couldn't help but find the place familiar; an octagonal room with a high ceiling, walls covered in bookcases and lit by blue crystals, and there was a single, heavy-looking mahogany desk in the back. On top of said desk, there were several white towers of office paper, along with an assortment of writing utensils and an honest-to-goodness old-timey typewriter. Aside from the one we entered, there was another entrance on our right, nearly lost between the bookcases, while the opposing wall on the left had a large cabinet with glass doors. I was half-expecting the musty scent of history in the air, but contrary to the fact that the books inside seemed old enough, all I could smell was a strange mixture of ink and some kind of sweet, possibly alcoholic fragrance.

Now, to be perfectly blunt, I've seen this room in the past, specifically when I was checking up on the class rep with my Far Sight, but I never connected the dots, probably because the occupant of this room never struck me as the grandfatherly type. Speaking of which...

”Come in, there is no reason to be shy,” came the deep yet somehow whimsical voice of an elderly man from inside, and when we did so, he dramatically turned around in the huge, padded swivel chair behind the desk (which, by the way, didn't fit the theme of the rest of the study at all).

In general, he looked the same as I remembered from my Far Sight. Our friendly neighborhood arch-mage was a lean old man with a bushy yet inexplicably well-kempt beard and a pair of equally abundant eyebrows on a high forehead. He was also dressed in a baggy black robe, yet under it I could see a fairly ordinary brown business suit that even had a tie, and as if just to make his garbs even more eclectic, he was also wearing a white Panama hat on top of all that. I mean, I get the rest, but who the hell wears a hat indoors like that? For some reason, that outfit wound me right up, and I was just about to give the man a snappy remark when I caught myself and hastily closed my mouth.

I blinked twice while looking at the Arch-mage and used the couple of seconds of silence, during which the rest of the group entered the study, to observe him a bit more closely. His face… well, he had a kind of grandfatherly smile. A big, friendly, eminently punchable grandfatherly smile that made me want to give a piece of my mind to the smug sod, and… god damn, I really do have an impulse control problem around important people who could kick my ass in a second! What the actual bloody hell?!

I quickly closed my eyes, lest I would get even more winded up by the sight of the old man, after which I took a deep breath, held it in for a second, and then slowly exhaled. Once I did that, I felt marginally more collected, so I opened my eyes again. By then the whole gang was already inside the study, and I could just barely catch the old geezer mutter something under his breath, at which point I saw practically every surface in the room flash with the familiar circuitry-like patterns, after which the doors instantly closed behind us and simultaneously the lights in the room rose in intensity.

”Whoa,” I heard Josh mutter under his breath, but I ignored him in favor of something weird I noticed.

I couldn't see it before, but now that the lighting conditions have significantly improved, I could tell that one of the old man's eyes was red. As in, not the actual iris, but the sclera around it, as if he had some nasty infection or got the blood vessels in his eye ruptured. The other eye seemed fine, but it was weird enough that I decided to ask about it once we were outside.

In the meantime, the Arch-mage lightly cleared his throat as he looked over us, only stopping when his eyes finally landed on Snowy.

”And so we meet again,” he spoke in a pleasant voice that still made my skin crawl, but I grit my teeth and only moved half a step closer to the Abyssal girl, just in case. He didn't seem to notice, or mind, as he continued by telling her, ”You have caused us quite a bit of headache, young lady.”

”I'm sorry, sir,” Snowy answered with her head down.

”I am certain you are,” Lord Grandpa told her with a calculated smile, but then he glanced over us and let out a small chuckle. ”Oh, but where did I leave my manners? I am known as Lord Amadeus Endymonion, head of the Timaeus School of Conjuration and Alteration.”

”Amadeus?” the surprised question slipped out of my mouth before I could stop it, and the old guy immediately glanced at me with a questioning look in his eyes.

”Is there a problem?”

”None at all,” I answered with a chipper voice that was only a tiny bit strained. ”Absolutely nothing. Please ignore me, like I wasn't even here.”